Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Janeway, James

by Alexander Gordon

JANEWAY, JAMES (1636?–1674), nonconformist divine, fourth son of William Janeway, and younger brother of John Janeway [q. v.], was born about the end of 1636 at Lilley, Hertfordshire, of which his father was curate. About 1655 he entered as a student at Christ Church, Oxford, and graduated B.A. on 12 Oct. 1659. He left the university at the Restoration, and lived in the house of Mrs. Stringer at Windsor, as tutor to her son George. Calamy includes him in his list of ‘ejected or silenced’ ministers, but furnishes no evidence that he had entered the ministry prior to the Uniformity Act of 1662. He seems to have first acted as a nonconformist preacher in London during the plague year, 1665, when several conventicles were opened. On the indulgence of 1672 a meeting-house was built for him in Jamaica Row, Rotherhithe, where he became very popular. After the withdrawal of the indulgence his meeting-house was wrecked by a band of troopers, but rebuilt on a larger scale. On two occasions Janeway escaped arrest. There was a tinge of religious melancholy in his character, and, like others of his family, he became consumptive. He died on 16 March 1674, ‘in the 38 yeare of his age,’ leaving a widow, Hannah, and was buried on 20 March in the church of St. Mary, Aldermanbury, near the grave of his brother Abraham. Funeral sermons were preached by Nathaniel Vincent and John Ryther. The portrait in Palmer's ‘Nonconformist's Memorial,’ 1803, iii. 511, is idealised from the emaciated visage which appears in an early print.

Janeway published, besides four single sermons, 1671–5:

1. ‘Heaven upon Earth,’ &c., 1670, 8vo; 1677, 8vo.
2. ‘A Token for Children … Account of the Conversion, holy and exemplary Lives and joyful Deaths of several young Children,’ &c., 1671, 8vo; 2nd part, 1672, 8vo (this extraordinary collection has been frequently reprinted, and still enjoys a reputation).
3. ‘Invisibles, Realities … the Holy Life and … Death of Mr. John Janeway,’ &c., 1673, 8vo (with commendatory epistles by Richard Baxter and others [see Janeway, John]).
4. ‘The Saints Encouragement,’ &c., 1673, 8vo.

Posthumous were:

1. ‘Legacie to his Friends … instances of … Sea-dangers and Deliverances,’ &c., 1674, 8vo, 1675, 8vo (portrait; edited by Ryther).
2. ‘Saints' Memorials; or Words Fitly Spoken,’ &c., 1674, 8vo (edited by Edmund Calamy, Joseph Caryl, and Ralph Venning).

[Funeral Sermons by Vincent, 1674, and Ryther, 1674; Wood's Athenæ Oxon. (Bliss), iii. 1006; Fasti, ii. 218; Calamy's Account, 1713, p. 838; Calamy's Continuation, 1727, ii. 962; Wilson's Dissenting Churches in London, 1814, iv. 346 sq.; Urwick's Nonconformity in Hertfordshire, 1884, pp. 658 sq.]

A. G.